Itinerary
131
nobles. The king was glorious on this happy occasion, and cheerful to all,
and shewed himself very jocose and affable. The nuptials having been
solemnly
celebrated in a royal manner, one day all the kingÕs galleys,
which had been anxiously looked for, arrived in port: they were equipped
and defended with splendid armouries, and no one ever saw better or safer
ships; and he added to them the five galleys which he had taken from the
emperor. The king had thus forty armed galleys and sixty others of a very
good quality.
Chapter XXXVI. Ñ
Of the conference and the manner of making peace between
the king and the emperor.
The king, elated with success, thought that fortune smiled upon him;
he therefore exhorted
his soldiers to expedition, and commanded them to
get every thing in readiness, lest the emperor should make a sudden attack
upon them; and he caused watches to be kept, and appointed sentinels to
guard the army. The king proposed with his army to pursue the emperor
wherever he was, and so take him by force or induce him to surrender; but
by the mediation and earnest request of the masters of the Hospitallers of
Jerusalem, it was determined that a conference should be held between the
king
and the emperor, who greatly lamented the loss of his men, and that
he had been forced to fly in a shameful manner to Nicosia from the face of
the king; and he feared pursuit the more, because the natives detested him,
and he could not, therefore, trust to their assistance. Wherefore, having
called together as many as he could, the king
proceeded to a very large
plain, between the sea and the highway, close by the city of Limozin. He
was mounted on a Spanish charger, of high mettle, of large size and elegant
shape, with high shoulder and pointed ears; his neck was long and slender,
and his thighs faultless; his feet were broad, and his limbs so perfectly
marked, that a painter could not have imitated them with perfect accuracy.
As if preparing
himself for a swifter movement, he disdained to be checked
by his golden curb, and by the alternate change of his feet he seemed at one
time to move forward on his hind, at another on his fore legs. The king
bounded into his saddle glittering with gold spangles interspersed with